Flourosis: BJP lies through its teeth

Released by the party’s State president Bandi Sanjay Kumar at Munugode, the chargesheet tries to counter the charge that the BJP-led Centre had done nothing to help the fluorosis victims.

Nalgonda: From claiming that the union government had given Rs 350 crore to help fluorosis victims in Munugode to saying that 54 lakh water connections were provided in Telangana under the Centre’s Jal Jeevan Mission, the BJP has resorted to several false claims in its ‘chargesheet’ against the TRS (BRS) government.

Released by the party’s State president Bandi Sanjay Kumar at Munugode on Thursday, the chargesheet tries to counter the charge that the BJP-led Centre had done nothing to help the fluorosis victims. It says the Vajpayee government had sanctioned Rs 350 crore in 2003, which helped them tackle the fluoride contamination issue.

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However, the fact is that this amount was used by government agencies in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh to set small tanks in some of the villages affected by fluorosis, which never served the purpose because there was no proper water supply to these tanks.

Fluorosis victims from Munugode, whose pictures the BJP has used in its chargesheet, have themselves countered the claims. They pointed out that after the first few years, when small amounts of water reached these tanks once in five days, the structures remained unused.

Speaking to Telangana Today, fluoride victim Kothapally Narsimha, a native of Kodandapuram in Nalgonda mandal whose photo figured under the fluorosis subject in the chargesheet, said a few families got one pot of water each from the tanks which were set up in 2003, that too once in five days. This was not sufficient for even a single day for the families, which had four to five members. The villagers were forced to consume the fluoride-contaminated groundwater for the remaining days of the week, he said.

The situation has changed in the last six years, with all the families in his village receiving adequate safe drinking water under Mission Bhagiratha. Another fluoride victim Amshala Swamy, whose picture was also used in the chargesheet, said he had seen women fight for water at the tanks more than a decade ago. The tank got water once every four-five days. When even half of the families in the village did not get a pot of water, how the BJP could claim that the issue was solved, he asked.

The BJP also claims water connections were provided to 54 lakh houses in the State under the Centre’s Jal Jeevan Mission when the truth is that these connections were given as part of the State government’s flagship Mission Bhagiratha scheme, a fact acknowledged and awarded by the Centre recently.

The chargesheet also conveniently does not mention that the Centre has not extended a single rupee for Mission Bhagiratha and did not even consider NITI Aayog’s recommendation for sanctioning Rs 19,000 crore for the project either. Vikas Ratan, a member of INTREM Foundation and consultant of Jal Jeevan Mission in 2020, said they had visited Nalgonda district to examine the water treatment plants of Mission Bhagiratha and found that the Centre had not extended any funds for the project.